NEW YORK – Personalis said Monday that it has filed a second patent infringement lawsuit suit against Foresight Diagnostics, seeking injunctive relief and monetary damages, bringing the total number of patents over which Personalis is suing Foresight to seven.
Filed in the US District Court for the District of Colorado, the suit alleges that Foresight improperly based its solid tumor minimal residual disease approach on technology already patented by Personalis under three recently issued but backdated patents, US Patent numbers 11,584,968, 11,643,685, and 11,649,507. Based on claims of priority, the three patents have 2014 and 2016 effective filing dates.
Personalis said that the patents in question cover aspects of its personalized cancer recurrence testing process, including whole-genome sequencing of a cancer patient’s tumor sample, which forms the basis for designing personalized tests to detect tumor-specific genetic variants in subsequent blood samples.
Personalis President and CEO Chris Hall said in a statement that the company intends to "continue to vigorously defend the investment we’re making in transforming the active management of cancer through breakthrough personalized testing."
The company currently holds 39 issued patents in total, and its initial infringement suit against Foresight was filed in August 2022, accusing Foresight of infringing four Personalis patents related to the same MRD solid tumor recurrence test. That suit has been stayed by the district court pending the outcome of inter partes review (IPR) proceedings before the US Patent and Trademark Office's Patent Trial and Appeal Board. The appeal body instituted IPRs of two of Personalis’ patents on June 13, 2023, and is expected to decide whether to do the same for the other two patents later this year.
At press time, Foresight Diagnostics did not respond to a request for comment.